


The Last Rays of the Golden Hour

by patiently_yours



Series: This Moment, Right Now [3]
Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: F/M, Post-Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-26
Updated: 2015-10-26
Packaged: 2018-04-28 07:28:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5083051
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/patiently_yours/pseuds/patiently_yours
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Phryne returns from an undercover job feeling less herself than usual.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Last Rays of the Golden Hour

**Author's Note:**

> I promise that this series is leading somewhere, but I think that perhaps it takes time for Phryne to come to terms with the fact that love changes everyone, since it demands space for another in our lives and hearts, and for her to be comfortable with the changes that it pulls out of her.

The last rays of golden, slanted autumn sun had long since faded away before Phryne flipped over the “Open” sign so that it read “Closed” and stepped outside as the shop door was locked behind her. Her tired feet carried her to the tram, which carried her home, and she hugged the coat of the cheapest wool closer to her body. The way that it made her skin itch was a small price to pay for the warmth that it gave her.

Her whole body ached in a way that she hadn’t known since the Great War, and her tongue was sore from tangling around words spoken in the Australian accent of her childhood. She hadn’t expected to revert to her Collingwood accent so quickly, just as she hadn’t expected to know work so demeaning again, and her pride was bruised along with the skin that had been repeatedly pinched by the men who had visited the shop where she was working undercover under the alias of Anna Roberts. But Anna would not have slapped the men in the face at their impertinence, and Phryne’s lips were raw from biting back scathing retorts all day. And to think, she would face it all again tomorrow, and the next day, and the next, until the ringleader for the crime ring that she was investigating was found.

Anna clung to her still as she let herself into Wardlow and crept quietly up the stairs. For some reason, she couldn’t shake the alias as quickly as she had in the past, when dashing in and out of character had sent thrills up her spine. But Anna was too close to home, too near the woman she had been after the Great War and her destructive relationship with Rene Dubois, and instead of the fear that she had known, Phryne found resignation sinking into her bones. 

Her bedroom was dark and quiet when she let herself in, and she put the brown hat she’d borrowed from Dot on the end of the bed and ran her hands through her cap of black hair, loosening the pins she’d put in that morning. Light spilled out from the bath, and when Phryne glanced up, she felt the air leave her lungs in a whoosh. 

There was Jack, fresh from a shower, his hair mussed and wet, his skin gleaming in the yellow light. As she watched, he dried his body and wrapped the towel around his waist. She must have made a noise, because he looked up, his eyes meeting hers from where she stood in the darkness.

“Phryne,” he said, his voice shaking her from the haze she had been in all day and reminding her of who she was. His face, so often carved of stone, melted at the sight of her, and she regained motion in her tired limbs and propelled herself from the darkness of her bedroom into the light and his arms. 

And, damn it all and God help her, the ache that began under her ribs and threatened to bring tears to her eyes would be her undoing, because she knew it, she knew. So she pulled the towel from Jack’s waist and pressed her lips to his warm, welcoming skin, and she reclaimed her boldness as Phryne again.

But she lost a bit of herself, as well, a piece she’d not realised she was holding so tightly. Sometime, without her notice and without her permission, Phryne Fisher had ceased to be an island and had chosen to be entwined with him.

So she loosened her grip on that piece and grabbed hold of peace, because she understood with startling clarity that she wouldn’t be fully herself if she were to be without him again.


End file.
